October 17, 2013 1:28 pm

Now that we are settled off a bit, I’ll begin making picks each week. I have to do this for the paper, so may as well put it on here and give you a chance to throw yours in.

To me, this game is pretty simple. You have arguably the best secondary in the league facing a turnover-prone passing offense.

Though, the Seahawks struggle down here, where they are 1-6 all-time at Unversity of Phoenix Stadium. Pete Carroll hasn’t won a division road game since 2011. The Seahawks are 1-3 on Thursday nights. They are 1-2 on the NFL Network. The last time they won in Arizona was 2010.

But, this is obviously a much better team than those were. Barring a repeat of the special teams disasters of the last two weeks, I think they should handle this game pretty easy. Call it 24-13, Seahawks.

Blog search

Twitter

About

Gregg Bell joined The News Tribune in July 2014. Bell had been the director of writing for the University of Washington's athletic department for four years. He was the senior national sports writer in Seattle for The Associated Press from 2005-10, covering the Seahawks in their first Super Bowl season and beyond. He's also been The Sacramento Bee's beat writer on the Oakland Athletics and Raiders. The native of Steubenville, Ohio, is a 1993 graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y., and a 2000 graduate of the University of California, Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism.

Feeds

I think we will see another ugly, low scoring game. Look for neither team to be able to get anything much going on offense. This game will hinge on turnovers (a battle the Seahawks should win), and maybe a special teams play – will this be the game Tate returns a punt for 6? In a tight game in the 4th quarter, I would much rather have the ball in the hands of Russell Wilson than Carson Palmer.

I don’t think you can say it was a poor draft yet. I think Michael, Ware, Willson, Bowie and Hill all have shown they will be contributors going forward – Williams and Simon haven’t had a chance to show much yet do to injuries, but I have some hope for them as well.

I’ve seen lots of Seahawk jerseys today. A small herd at the rest stop on the way from Tucson and the hotel says there are lots of Seahawks fans staying here. They look like they will be well represented at the game. I have tickets to a concert we got before the football schedule came out and will be doing that instead tonight and monitoring the game on my phone and catch it on game rewind tomorrow.

Got a hunch we’re either going to destroy them (38-10) or we’ll lose. Really hoping for the first option. We’ve been so inconsistent in the last couple of games, I think it’s 50/50 as to which option comes to pass.

AZ is a pretty good team with a strong D. They were in that SF game and it was closer than the final score indicated.

I’m really hoping that PC, Bevell and the rest of the coaches are able to make the necessary adjustments in-game on this one. Because with a short week, I just don’t know how much time you really have to gameplan and install.

At some point, a strong team is going to have a draft class here or there that doesn’t stick. If the team has a lot of young, quality players from previous drafts, a team wants to keep them. Having quality players around 2-3 years of experience is gold, and you’ll keep them over rookies.

If you cut the 2-3 year players to make room for rookies, then it just means the previous drafts weren’t as good as you thought they were.

The real measure is if people are picking up the players Seattle is cutting loose. Since that seems to be the case, I don’t think Seattle’s draft braintrust has shown they’re losing their touch.

A number of 3-4 year players will move on next season, and then there will be room for rookies of the same or better level to make the team (plus practice squad types.)

20-6 Seahawks. Dockett and Peterson will make the offense struggle. I’d test Campbell early and often though. See how he handles Beast Mode coming at him. I do not think the AZ offense is much of a threat to do anything though.

Everyone keeps complaining about Sweezy, but I doubt he is benched when Okung is back, it will be Carp or McQ. Sweezy is the only Hawk to play every offensive snaps so far this season. Cable has a lil’ chub for Sweezy.

We welcome comments. Please keep them civil, short and to the point. ALL CAPS, spam, obscene, profane, abusive and off topic comments will be deleted. Repeat offenders will be blocked. Thanks for taking part and abiding by these simple rules.